


Avengers Alphabet

by Zylle



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Crack and Angst, Not Avengers friendly, Not Beta Read, Not Steve Friendly, Sorry Not Sorry
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-06-26
Updated: 2019-10-03
Packaged: 2020-05-20 02:50:38
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 14
Words: 4,475
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19368484
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Zylle/pseuds/Zylle
Summary: Random alphabetical drabbles set in the MCU





	1. A: Amber

He had made up his mind the second he knew his team had won.  
Thanos was dead.  
Stark was dead.  
There was no one left to stop him.  
Heroes deserved a reward. Everyone knew that!  
He put on the jumpsuit, told everyone he'd be right back once he'd  
returned the Infinity Stones.  
It wasn't really a lie.  
He'd go back once he'd gotten what he deserved. 

He reappeared in 1970.  
She was there, waiting for their dance.  
He took her in his arms. His. All his, finally.  
They danced, kissed, talked.  
When her questions got a little too annoying, he suggested  
they might stop talking in favor of 'fondue'.  
She smiled and led him upstairs to her bedroom.

He woke a few hours later...  
standing on that platform, the Infinity Stones in their case...  
"I'll be right back," he heard himself say, nodded to Bucky, and  
hit the button. 

He had made up his mind the second he knew his team had won.

Thanos was dead.  
Stark was dead.  
There was no one left to stop him.  
Heroes deserved a reward. Everyone knew that!  
He put on the jumpsuit, told everyone he'd be right back once he'd  
returned the Infinity Stones.  
It wasn't really a lie.  
He'd go back once he'd gotten what he deserved.  
He reappeared in 1970.  
She was there, waiting for their dance.  
He took her in his arms. His. All his, finally.  
They danced, kissed, talked.  
When her questions got a little too annoying, he suggested  
they might stop talking in favor of 'fondue'.  
She smiled and led him upstairs to her bedroom.

He woke a few hours later...  
standing on that platform, the Infinity Stones in their case...  
"I'll be right back," he heard himself say, nodded to Bucky, and  
hit the button.  
He reappeared in 1970.  
She was there, waiting for their dance.  
He took her in his arms. His. All his, finally.  
They danced, kissed, talked.  
When her questions got a little too annoying, he suggested  
they might stop talking in favor of 'fondue'.  
She smiled and led him upstairs to her bedroom.

He waited until she fell asleep, then tried to walk downstairs...  
He found himself  
standing on that platform, the Infinity Stones in their case...  
"I'll be right back," he heard himself say, nodded to Bucky, and  
hit the button.  
He reappeared in 1970.

He didn't go to Peggy. He thought maybe,  
if he hit the return button immediately,  
instead of staying in the branch he was supposed to  
cut off...

"I'll be right back..."

"I'll be right back..."

"I'll be right..." 

"I'll be..."

Leaving didn't work. 

Staying didn't work.

 

Going to Howard instead of to Peggy didn't work.

Confessing the truth didn't work. 

Lying didn't work. 

Killing her didn't work.

Killing himself didn't work.

There was no white light to  
embrace him

No life flashing before his eyes

Only a brief flash of malevolent green

and that 

damned

platform


	2. A: Android

Tony showed Morgan how to build a circuit board when she was six weeks old.

Pepper didn't say she disapproved. 

They'd agreed not to fight in front of their daughter. 

He just found himself sleeping on a lumpy, moldy-smelling couch for the next four weeks.

She did love the little sketches Morgan put on the refrigerator.

They watched Disney princesses together on Saturday mornings, a new Stark tradition.

Pepper even tried to learn to bake cookies. 

Tony and Morgan ate them, though they were a bit salty or charred.

They all agreed to stick with Oreos finally.

It was easy, and he _liked_ easy. 

Peaceful. 

The doctors had said a pregnancy was "so unlikely as to be impossible." 

"You'd have better odds of winning the lottery twice, Mr. Stark."

Apparently, a woman in her mid-forties and a man of almost fifty years, 

who'd spent his life drinking, drugging, 

and oh yes, being exposed to heavy metal for years

weren't hitting the high scores in the Game of Life. 

You couldn't buy off Mother Nature.

~~You could sneak around the old bitch, though.~~

Beating impossible odds were his job description. 

He had plenty of money, 

~~more~~ than enough vibranium, 

between Rogers' shield and...other remnants...

and access to Cho's cradle.

They made it work.

No one else knew, not even Happy or his platypus

and definitely not the public.

She was his greatest accomplishment. 

Pepper had had reservations about having children

even the old-fashioned way

But he'd convinced her. 

"She won't age. You'll never be alone again even if  
something happens to me."

"When she grows up--Yes, she'll grow. I'm sure of it."

"Starks are made of iron, remember?"


	3. B: Bargaining

"C'monnn, Pep," Tony wheedled. "Just once. I'll play nice at the next meeting. I'll even go by myself, promise."

"What part of 'no' do you not fucking understand here?" 

She used the profanity deliberately, a try to shock him out of his  
self-absorbed, hungover mood. This was Tony at his worst. 

It had become a vanishingly rare occasion in the last three years since they married,  
but somehow it was worse for the scarcity. 

He did a double take. "Language, Virginia--" he teased. 

She snatched the half-empty glass out of his hand and smashed it.  
Glass shards sprayed everywhere. 

"I handled it for you when you were too caught up in another  
all-night 'inventing' spree to address your obligations to  
your own company. Dozens of times, Tony."

"I handled it when you got drunk and insulted our own employees  
for not being 'top rank geniuses' like you. 

When you treated female reporters and officials like your personal  
toybox, bought and paid for. 

When you weren't there for the Board, or Rhodey, or Maria Hill, or me.  
I _handled_ it. 

Your daughter is not a Board member," she hissed. "You will not opt out of the hard stuff and   
leave it to me.  
Either you're her father or you aren't. No 'sometimes yes, sometimes no'.  
Now get dressed. The doctor's appointment is in thirty minutes, and we  
_will_ both be there. "

"It's inefficient," he tried. "They don't need both of us.  
You're better at this sort of medical dialogue than me.  
You know I hate doctors' offices.  
I just think it makes more sense for me to stay with Morgan  
and keep her entertained, while you go. They listen to you."  


"Because I know how to return the favor."

She waited until he stumbled over to the closet before she turned her back on him.

Took a deep breath.

Walked downstairs to their dining room to fix Morgan's breakfast.


	4. B: Bussing

Nat didn't know what she'd expected when Rhodey asked her  
to help with 'community outreach'.

Thanos had met the Avengers in Wakanda three days ago, and  
crushed them like barely annoying cockroaches.

News had poured in from all over the world on their flight  
"home."  


Cars, trains, jets left with nobody at the controls. 

Doctors vanished mid-surgery, their patients left bleeding out. 

Police turned to ash while patrolling the streets, in full view of the 'criminal  
element' who were quick to grab at new opportunities.

Blood in the water.

Ashes drifting everywhere, thick and gray. 

Every cop or first responder worked themselves to exhaustion that first night.

Nat wiped what was left (she thought) of Wanda Maximoff and Samuel Wilson off her hands, and got to work. 

She pushed Steve Rogers away roughly when he tried to hug her.

The second time he tried to touch her 'comfortingly,' she broke his wrist. 

"I'm not your fucking Peggy or Barnes, Rogers. Find another damsel in distress." 

The others backed away from her afterward, even Bruce,  
for which she was grateful.

She had no interest in comfort, comfort sex, drinking, or talking it out.

She killed the first looter who tried to attack a house where a little boy and his newborn  
sister had been left unsupervised.

Rhodey had calmly talked her out of sawing his head off and displaying it on a fence as a  
warning. "Disappear him instead. That's scarier in the long run. Unanswered questions  
or fears instead of facts they can deny."

He brought her extra ammo, rations, and a bottle of water, when she'd been 'on duty' longer than  
six hours. 

She didn't argue, just muttered thanks, ate, and got back to work.

Two days. Three. Four.

Stark Industries had opened the Tower to offer emergency shelter and services to New York's  
people. 

Steve, Rhodes, Bruce and Pepper insisted she sleep at the Tower instead of just crashing   
somewhere at random. She gave in with bad grace. 

She made chicken and rice soup late one night, from a recipe Laura Barton  
had shown her. 

 

Rhodes had caught her doing it. He'd suggested(in that tone of voice that   
made it more of an order) that she make more, and he'd bake some bread   
to go with it.

She'd thought he was making a clumsy attempt at a team dinner.

Instead, she found herself ladling soup into bowls at the Tower's new 'public kitchen'.

A little girl who had blood dried into her hair, and unwashed clothes,   
squinted up at her as Nat crouched by her chair for a closer look.

"Mommy?"

Nat didn't reply, but took the toddler's hand in hers.


	5. C: Carnival

The Asset's memories of NYC were like so much broken glass.

Sharp enough to cut, but too fragmented and random for any practical  
use. 

This place was an exception.

Merry-go-rounds. 

A rollercoaster that screeched like a man being boiled alive. 

Children running and laughing to stand in line for the bumper cars. 

 

The smells tugged at his attention. Hot dogs. Cotton candy. Fireworks. 

 

He slipped into the crowd waiting to enter a "haunted house." 

 

The hallway full of mirrors made him stop halfway through the tour. 

 

He stared at his own reflection.

No. It wouldn't work.

They'd already invented hundreds of monsters for this attraction. 

 

There was no room for him. He'd look elsewhere for a hiding place. 

 

A woman holding a poorly concealed syringe tried to sneak up on him

as he walked along a cold, sandy shore.

 

He snapped her neck and stuffed her body under the nearest pile of garbage. 

 

 _Cut off one head, two more grow._

He could only stay hidden so long. 

He glanced out at the cold waters, and shook his head finally. 

He knew this much: when he died, if he chose to end it, he wanted fire, not ice. 

 

 

.


	6. C: Cat

Nicholas J. Fury was many things.

A decent shot.

Multilingual.

Veteran.

Spy. 

Fighter. 

African-American and damn proud of it. 

But one thing he'd never put on 

his bucket list

Was figuring out how to find a vet for a cat 

that _ate people who annoyed her._

Goose had never gotten sick once in the five years he'd had her  
(or she had him, which the fuck ever it was was open to debate). 

In the past two weeks, she'd visibly gained weight 

and gotten viciously territorial about the space under his desk.

And around it.

SHIELD had plenty of experience in creating believable cover stories for the public about  
the crazy shit some field agents encountered. True.

However, that worked against him. "Never bullshit a bullshitter," and all that.

He finally had to resort to asking Hill for help (and ohhh was he ever not going to  
hear the end of THAT. He'd go to his grave with her smug I-told-you-sos in his ears.)

"...no chance she's about to have a litter, is she?" was the first question his second-in-command  
asked. 

He started to say no, then stopped.

How was he supposed to know the Flerken Facts of Life??

He sighed, and stocked up on blankets, extra kitten toys, droppers, food...

Goose nearly bit Coulson's finger off one early morning when he dropped some paperwork by Nick's printer...

Wait.

Goose wasn't black and white...

or solidly black...

or a silver tabby...

or...

_"Motherflerken!"_


	7. D: Despair

He can't scream. 

~~He can beg, not that it does him any good.~~

The Other enjoys licking the tears off his cheeks. 

He resisted the first time.   
Thanos had appeared when they carried his bloodied lieutenant out of the cell.  
Asgardian bones are harder to break than those of some races.  
But not that hard.   
He spent the night in the cell with his 'Master'.   
After that was accomplished, the Mad Titan stopped exercising restraint. 

 

He is fed enough not to starve to death.  
No one speaks to him except to ask questions. 

Days pass sometimes without him seeing anyone else.  
Days turn to weeks, to months.   
He no longer loves to hear himself speak. 

The binding symbols the Maw carved into his back prevent him from using _seidr_   
against his captors, or against himself.   
When Thanos hands him the scepter containing the Mind Stone, he looks at it  
and feels nothing. 

Oh, yes, he wonders why they didn't use it themselves sooner...  
but why does why matter now? 

He has his mission.   
He pretends to believe the Other's assurances of his rule over Earth.   
It's not as easy to keep from laughing at the words as it should be. 

Not anymore. He wonders how arrogant or stupid they still consider him.   
Tools are made to be used up, after all.

He faces off with a fierce, quick-witted Midgardian who tries to shoot him. 

Perhaps the man would prefer death to being unmade, too.  
He'll see to it that his new slave doesn't survive the invasion, he decides.   
One of them could escape, at least.


	8. D: Dissension

Steve jabbed at the punching bag. Right. Left. Right. Barely breaking up a sweat. 

He had turned down Sam's offer to spar earlier. Sam was a better-than-average fighter, but  
he was no super-soldier. Just now, Steve wanted a fight where he didn't have to hold back.

Convenient, then, that Stark appeared in the door behind him.

Steve faked a smile as he turned around. "Hey, Tony."

"FRIDAY said you asked for a meeting. What's up, Cappucino?" 

"It's about Wanda. INS agents came by yesterday. They're questioning her presence  
in the United States. "

Tony grimaced, rubbing at his forehead.

. "She did kinda skip past the formalities, Steve. She has no sponsor, no family here, no job--"

"She deserves a second chance. She's trying to change. That's not easy. And she's alone."

Stark's face darkened. "That tends to happen when you make terrorism your career choice." 

"She didn't--!"

"She's HYDRA, Steve. What else would you call it?"

"She's an Avenger now," Steve insisted.

"So was Bruce. So was I. If we'd pulled this sort of crap, nobody would be giving us a get out of   
jail free card."

"You could fix at least the legal issues. You would if it were Bruce or Rhodey maybe being jailed. "

"No, I wouldn't, because _they wouldn't ask me to._ Or need me to!" 

Tony threw up his hands. "We're talking in circles here." 

Scarlet fire lit up the room. 

Tony stilled as Wanda appeared from behind Steve. "Nice little disappearing trick, Witch."

"You're like any man," caressing Steve's arm. "You see what you want to see." 

Steve smiled at her. She pulled his head down for a kiss. 

Wanda laughed at Tony's shock. "He's lonely. I know how that feels. Missing his Peggy,   
Bucky--even you, once in a while. With me he can forget." She pouted. "But not if I have   
to leave. You're going to fix that for us. For him."

 

Tony shuddered and--was that a flash of red in Steve's eyes? "Riiight." 

She walked up to him, tapping the new arc reactor with one of her fingernails. 

"Or I can change your mind for you," she whispered. "This is all that keeps me out. Do you think you can

wear it for the rest of your life? What about your Rhodey, or Pepper? "

 

"Don't you dare--" he began dangerously. The instant of distraction cost him.

 

The arc reactor was no longer embedded in his chest. 

Small mercies, that kept him from dying immediately when she used her magic to tear it away and crush it.

Steve's punch caught him in the jaw. He went down, mouth filling with blood.


	9. E: Ears

He'd fought Mafia, scary Russian assassins, soldiers, 'Gods', even aliens...

But he wouldn't be the least bit surprised if what finally killed him was a pissed-off  
Laura Barton. Nor would he blame her, at the moment. 

**Where the hell were his hearing aids?!?**

Granted he likely didn't _need_ them to figure out that Laura shaking him at three bloody a.m.,

making pained faces, and holding her due-date-a-week-away belly, 

meant he should get his ass out of bed. 

He yanked on the nearest clothes he found on the floor, giving up the search for now. 

Someone--probably Lila, who demonstrably had inherited her mother's practical intelligence--had had

the presence of mind to wake Natasha. She'd come to stay with them when Laura was close to delivery, as she had 

for their other children. 

She shoved a box into his hand. His spares; she always kept an extra pair with her kit, since Budapest. 

"...the car around. Help her downstairs." 

He put them in, and nodded. "Got it. "

Laura's hands tightened painfully on his. Yeah, he was going to have bruises, and they weren't even doing the Lamaze 

stuff yet.

They made it to the hospital anyhow, as opposed to Cooper's birth, which had been a home affair (a tired/distracted Laura had mistaken labor pains for indigestion after a summer barbecue and not caught on til the contractions were too close together for walking _anywhere_ to be an option. )

Nat helped them into the building, then left to sit with Cooper and Lila at the farm. 

Nathaniel, like Clint, proved to be the sort who didn't wait for anything long. Labor was blessedly short, and by eight a.m. the newest Barton was making an entrance. 

His son's first cry was the sweetest sound he'd heard in a long time.

Laura gestured at him when he looked back at her. (How does Nathaniel Pietro Barton strike you?)

He grinned. "Sounds like a winner." 


	10. Extract

Tony had done a lot of 'all-nighters' in the last forty *cough* years, whether they were alcoholic binges, orgies, or inventing sprees.

About fifty percent of them, he estimated, he didn't remember. 

The other fifty? Hey. Good times. 

He'd never wished not to remember things. He had watched Alzheimer's eat away Peggy Carter's memories,  
and had been hard put not to shudder.

Until he switched on his TV one morning, and saw a helicarrier drop into the Potomac.

Until the Internet was flooded with thousands of previously classified files on undercover agents, their current missions and locations, their grandmothers, best friends, young children...all laid out for the public's reading pleasure.

He had never wished for the chance to choke someone out the way Loki had him.

If he'd had Rogers or Romanoff or even Fury ( _I didn't give you my tech for THIS, you lying sack of **shit!**_ ) within arm's length, however...there might have been one more corpse that day.

He helped rescue as many as he could. Stark Industries had offices and employees in dozens of countries. 

Surprisingly few of the Board or his regional managers balked at SI involvement, or Iron Man's, when he explained the situation. 

Worked to near exhaustion, only stopped when JARVIS reported his vitals to Pepper despite Tony's insistence that he was fine. 

The death toll stayed in triple digits rather than quadruple, at least. 

Rogers phoned him a week after the kerfuffle in D.C. 

Tony didn't pick up or call back.

 

He took a hot shower one night, scrubbed a week's worth of sweat, ashes, old blood smears, off his skin  
and went on a pub crawl to get very, very drunk by himself.

A couple of girls tried to flirt with him, and one young man.

Tony sent them away in tears or white-faced and shaking. 

His anger felt like it might rip something to shreds. 

He gulped down Scotch and then vodka.

The musician performing at one end of the bar came over to him, guitar slung across his back.

"You're Anthony Stark." 

"Yessh. What do you want?"

"I meant to ask you that. Pretty sure my daughter and grandchildren are alive because of you." 

He ran a hand through slicked-back dark hair. "You look like you're fixin' to kill somebody. Hope you can  
tell me it ain't you yourself."

"They lied. I trusted them and they're shtill lying. 'Best suited to defend my _ass_..."

 

"Truth is like the sun. You can shut it out for a time, but it ain't going away. That's not all on you,  
sir. You've done a lot. Rest and be distracted for awhile," he suggested, his voice soft. 

"You take requests?" Tony slurred. 

"For you, anything. " 

Tony told him a song title. 

"Niiice. Come up and sing with me, if you want." 

He strolled back to the stage, white jacket and jewelry gleaming.

Started to sing. 

"Joshua fit the battle of Jericho  
Jericho, Jericho  
Joshua fit the battle of Jericho  
and the walls come tumbling down..."


	11. Felony

Jane didn't know what to expect when she saw Thor again.

They were over, had been since that whole incident in London. 

Since his father called her a 'goat' and he didn't say anything in her defense.

She'd almost died, and his father wouldn't have cared. She suspected most of Asgard's 

people, with the exceptions of Thor and his mother, wouldn't have either. 

He could no more share a lifetime with her than she could with him. She'd grow and

yes, eventually age, and he'd still be a barely grown man who hadn't yet stopped looking

to others for direction. 

He was beautiful, caring and strong, but...

But.

So, almost five years went by.

She continued her work. Occasionally, she heard news stories about the Avengers.

She didn't avoid such things. Neither did she seek them out.

Until the day Darcy, trying on a wedding dress, stopped with her hands on the white silk and choked   
out …. "Jane...?" before she disintegrated. 

Half of Chicago--where they'd been currently, visiting Darcy's family--were dead before Jane got out of the changing   
room.

She tried to contact Thor then. She wanted answers, damn it--

He didn't call her back for over a week. 

When he did, it was to ask her to come to the Avengers Compound. 

She stormed into the building, caught between fury and grief.

A drunken Thor and grimly silent Steve Rogers greeted her, and told her what had happened.

She fought the urge to shake sobriety into her ex, instead helping the surviving Avengers try to track the Mad Titan.

Later that night, she stretched out on one of the cots in the lab. She was too tired even to keep her eyes open.

Someone shook her roughly awake.

"Thor? What the hell--"

His hands were on her shoulders, painfully tight. "Let go," she hissed. "You're hurting me!"

She tried to pry his fingers off. He ignored her, jerking her closer to him.

"I. I need." 

She could smell the alcohol on his breath. 

"No! Dammit--get off me--"

He forced her chin up for a rough kiss. Shoved her back onto the cot, his weight pinning her down.

She struggled, cursed at him, screamed for help.

He didn't listen. 

When he drove into her, she bit her tongue, feeling jabs of pain as electricity burned along her skin. 

Bones snapped in her wrist when she tried to claw at his face. 

He stilled. 

Withdrew, but didn't let her up. 

She glared at him in pure hatred. "Get. Off. Me."

"Not tonight."


	12. Fulgurite

Asgardian stamina notwithstanding, Thor finally needed to stop.

He fell asleep next to Jane, alcohol and exhaustion dragging him under.

She squirmed out from underneath him.

Breathing was painful.

Her wrist was swollen, throbbing, and she could see dark bruises purpling over  
her body; neck, chest, legs.

She looked around.  
The sheer terror of the last several hours gave way to anger that  
was as cold as Norway's snows. 

His axe...Stormbreaker? lay by the door. 

She stalked over to it.

The metal was cool under her palms as she snatched it up. 

Bright sparks flew along the axe-head. 

She was startled by the pain suddenly ceasing. Stormbreaker...hummed? and the steel grew warmer. 

She could lift it easily, it even felt...right?

A vindictive smile curved her lips. 

She turned to look at her _former_ lover, still snoring on obliviously...

But no. 

She wouldn't be weak, or cowardly, attacking someone who couldn't defend themselves.

She was Midgardian, not some cast-off Asgardian halfwit. 

When she next faced Thor, he would be awake for it. And she'd make sure his 'shieldbrothers' knew _exactly_   
what kind of man he was.

For now...

She stroked her weapon's handle.

"Find. Me. Thanos," she whispered.


	13. Gecko

"C'mon, Lindsey. Please? I'll do all your divorce prep work for a week."

"No."

"I'll take you out to the Four Seasons. Whatever you want." 

"No."

"I'll let you have the corner office back.' 

"...No." 

*Puppy-Dog eyes of DOOOM*

"No. Sorry, Lilah. It's your turn to take one for the team."

"But we don't even do this sort of law--" 

"Lilah, when your client is Tony Fucking Stark, your job responsibilities is whatever he says they are."

"I can't believe he doesn't have his own liability insurer--"

"Li. Sweetie. Pumpkinhead. Think about what you're saying. The man had to dispose of a nuclear missile without assistance,   
and fight an army. From space. And he's still IN the line of work that GOT him in that situation. 

Insurance companies not only won't take his calls. They run the other way when they see him coming."

 

"Okay, but..."

"He likes the Hard Rock Café. I try to meet him there. If we hold meetings at his offices, there's too many interruptions.   
And his 'bots don't like strangers in his workshop."

"Does he like dogs?" 

"Take Clifford with you and find out. Just...don't mention that damn gecko. Or Skynet."


	14. Gold

Snowflakes drifted down onto the lake.

She faced into the chilly breeze, watching the sun rise and paint the horizon vivid red and gold. 

Ironic.

A reminder she didn't need. 

She'd promised him that if he didn't come back from a mission, someday, if he left before her, that she   
wouldn't bury her heart or her dreams with him.

The biggest dream she'd had, he'd already fulfilled, that of a home and a family.

She twisted the ring on her finger. She'd lost weight in the last half-year; not an unhealthy amount, but   
enough that the metal slid free without struggle.

"Goodbye," she whispered. 

She put the ring in the black velvet box he'd offered to her, six years ago, and firmly closed it.

Behind her, she heard a door open and the sound of Morgan's giggles. 

She pocketed the box and turned away, walking to the porch alone. She didn't look back.


End file.
